A pair of company directors charged hundreds of customers VAT and pocketed the cash, according to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC).

HMRC said Adrian Daykin and Robert Bowler used a false VAT number to keep £54,934.

Daykin, (54) of Nether Street, in Harby, in the Vale of Belvoir, near Melton, and Bowler (47) of The Paddock, in Widmerpool, on the Leicestershire/Nottinghamshire border, used the scam on more than 1,800 invoices over a five-year period from 2011.

In fact, HMRC said, the pair were trading under a VAT number belonging to their previous joint business Dayler Glass and Windows, and pocketing VAT from customers instead of paying it to revenue officers.

They were arrested in March 2017, and searches of both homes, and the company address in Moreland Street, Nottingham, were said to have uncovered 1,828 fraudulent VAT invoices.